Clark Blackman Receives AICPA's 2012 PFP Distinguished Service Award

Las Vegas(Jan. 23, 2013) — The American Institute of CPAs is pleased to announce Clark M. Blackman II, CPA/PFS and founder of Alpha Wealth Strategies in Houston, as the recipient of the 2012 Personal Financial Planning Distinguished Service Award.

Blackman received the award late Tuesday at the Institute’s 2013 Advanced Personal Financial Planning Conference in Las Vegas. The AICPA awards the PFP Distinguished Service Award annually to an AICPA volunteer who significantly contributes to the advancement of personal financial planning as a practice discipline.

“Clark is a role model for financial planners,” said Jeannette Koger, the AICPA’s director of member specialization and credentialing. “Through many years as a volunteer on the AICPA’s financial planning committees and those in his home state of Texas, Clark has worked tirelessly to enhance the role of the CPA financial planner and has pushed young CPAs to follow in his footsteps.”

Blackman has been active in the PFP division for two decades and is the immediate past chair of the division’s executive committee. He has worked to strengthen ties with state societies, enhance the AICPA’s annual financial planning conference and develop tools and guides to help CPAs effectively expand their practices to include financial planning services. Under his leadership, the PFP executive committee last fall received standard setting authority from the AICPA’s governing council.

Blackman has written or co-authored more than 50 articles on financial planning topics published over the past 15 years. He has been a featured speaker at numerous national conferences and was named to Accounting Today’s list of 100 most influential people of 2011. Blackman was recognized by Worth magazine as one of the “Best Financial Advisors in America” from 1996 through 2004 and in January 2004 he was selected by Robb ReportWorth publishers as one of “The Nation’s 100 Most Exclusive Wealth Advisors.” He was presented the “Distinguished Service to the Profession” award by the Houston CPA Society in 2004 and was inducted into the AICPA’s Hall of Fame in October 2005.

Blackman holds an undergraduate degree in finance from the University of Iowa Tippee College of Business and a graduate degree in accounting from the University of Iowa Graduate School. He has worked in the financial services industry since 1980 and lived in Houston since 1995.